Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
The annual lectureship at the Florida School of Preaching offers four full days of in-depth biblical studies and spiritual growth. With insightful lessons from various speakers, attendees deepen their understanding of Scripture and connect with fellow Christians. Recordings and a published book are available for those who wish to revisit the lessons or share them with others.
I have been blessed to be here today and really wish I could have been here the whole
week.
It's really been a tremendous feast.
And my life is blessed by the fact that you're training gospel preachers to preach the
Word here.
And we need more of that across this whole wide world, wouldn't you agree?
We need as many faithful gospel preachers as we can get.
I don't care where they get trained as long as they get trained and as long as they preach
the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth with compassion and love for souls.
That's really what it all amounts to.
And so thankful, thankful for you.
Some of the last words that Jesus ever spoke were the words that we read about in Matthew
and Mark and Luke.
And in Mark's account, we read him saying this, go ye into all the world and preach the
gospel to every creature.
He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved, but he that believeth not shall be
damned.
And there are other things in that section from Mark 16, nine through 20 that were spoken
by Jesus.
And there are some folks who would tell you tonight that he didn't really say those words.
and that they don't really belong in your Bible.
As a matter of fact, some of you might even have a marginal note around verse 9, which
suggests that from verses 9 to 22 of the best and oldest manuscripts do not contain these
verses, and the implication is therefore they really were spurious, that Mark didn't write
them by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
They were added later on.
by someone else, a scribe, interpolated them, and that's how those words got in there, but
we just want you to know that.
Well, that means one of the first questions we have to address tonight is this.
Is this passage genuine?
Because if it's not, if it didn't really come from Jesus, I don't want anything to do with
it.
But if it did come from Jesus, I want to know everything about it, and I want to live it
out.
And so this is foundational.
And I'm not going to give you the entire package of information on this.
I wrote about this some years ago by assignment and wrote a lot more than I'll be able to
give you here in this brief message.
But the first question I want to address tonight regarding Mark's commission from Jesus'
lips is, it genuine?
Did Jesus really say these things?
Well, that gets us into the subject of whether
We know how we got the Bible and I can't get into all of that except to tell you this.
No one would claim tonight that we have Mark's original document that he wrote and that we
have it and can put it on display and say this is Mark's original document of the Gospel
of Mark.
No one says that.
But I can tell you that God in his providence made it possible for those original
documents written by Matthew, Mark, Luke and John and other writers to be copied.
meticulously copied and then copied again and again and again and again and again so that
we have more manuscript evidence for the New Testament than we do for some of the
well-accepted works like Homer's Odyssey and Shakespeare and others.
No one questions whether we have their work and we have a lot less information and
manuscript evidence from them.
We don't have any of their originals either.
but no one doubts that we have their work.
So someone suggests, well, Mark didn't really write this, but do you know that they say
two of the best and oldest manuscripts don't contain Mark 16, nine to 20.
Well, ask this question every time you read that or every time you hear that, ask this
question, who gets to decide what is the best manuscript?
Now, they argue, well, it's missing from Codex Vaticanus and Codex Sinaiticus.
And those are terms referring to either where it was found or where it's been preserved.
And so those are two of five ancient unsealed manuscripts.
Unseals are manuscripts written in capital letters.
And so two of the five don't have Mark 16, 9 to 20.
And we're told that that means something because watch this logic and then watch them run
away from this logic a little bit later when I give you some other evidence.
Why would you say Mark 16, 9 to 20 don't belong when in 99 % of the manuscripts we have
Mark 16, 9 to 20?
Why would you say we don't really need it in the Bible?
Well, two of the best and old.
What makes them the best?
Well, they're the oldest.
The older you get...
The closer you get to the Apostolic Age, file that away.
The closer you get to the Apostolic Age, the more accurate the information and the more
weighty the evidence.
That's what we're told.
How many of you have a footnote in your Bible or a marginal note in your Bible that says
at Hebrews 9, 14, from this point on the book of Hebrews does not appear in the Codex
Vaticanus?
How many of you have a marginal note or anything in your Bible that suggests 1st, 2nd
Timothy, Titus, Philemon, and the Book of Revelation are not in Codex Vaticanus?
Therefore, one of the best and oldest manuscripts does not contain 1st and 2nd Timothy,
Titus, Philemon, the Book of Revelation, and Hebrews 9, 15 and following.
Therefore, just take those out of your Bible or we'll put all those verses in brackets.
Well, no, they don't say that.
Well, if you're going to be consistent, why would you make a big deal out of, well, Mark
16, 9 through 20 is not in Codex Vaticanus and Codex Sinaiticus.
Why would you make a big deal out of that when there are a lot of books, entire books that
don't appear?
Because largely for the same reason why I'm using almost a brand new Bible tonight,
because the one I've been using for years has pages falling out of it.
and things that are missing from it because the older something is, the more likely it is
for something to go missing.
But if something is missing, that doesn't mean it was never there in the first place.
And so you would expect older documents to have some things missing.
Do you know that the Codex Sinaiticus has all of the New Testament in it, but it's missing
almost the entire book of Genesis.
and many other sections, large sections of the Old Testament.
No one says, well, therefore those books should not be in our Bibles.
I want to suggest to you tonight that one of the reasons why Mark 16, 9 to 20 has been
singled out as one that we've got to get rid of is because it's got one of the clearest
statements about the essentiality of baptism you could ever find in the entire Word of God
anyway.
And I personally don't think it's accidental that so much focus has been given to whether
it should be.
So the manuscript evidence, let me hurry on and tell you this, versions.
Versions were translated, I'm talking early second century versions.
Now let me make a point, Vaticanus and Sinaiticus are manuscripts that are dated back to
the fourth century fourth century.
The versions that I'm about to mention to you like the
Peshittic Syriac.
It dates back to the second century and it contains Mark 16, nine through 20, as do a
number of the ancient versions that predate Codex Vaticanus and Sinaiticus.
Those versions had Mark 16, nine to 20 in them.
Tell me how those words from Mark 16, nine to 20 got in those versions because they were
found in manuscripts that those.
were used to translate into those versions.
So they were present, those words were present in the versions.
Let me give you some more evidence.
Irenaeus, about 180 AD, way before, 200 years before at least the time of Vaticanus and
Sinaiticus, he said as he quotes from Mark 16, nine to 20, now wait a minute, what was
their argument we saw earlier?
The older and the closer you get to the original apostolic age, the more weighty the
evidence.
Okay, well wait a minute, what about Irenaeus quoting Mark 16, 19 and explicitly
attributing it to Mark in 180 AD?
Does that count as closer than your Codex Vaticanus and Sinaiticus?
Oh well, yeah, but no.
You don't get to pick and choose when that matters.
Atasian around 170 AD produced the Harmony of the Gospels.
It's one of the first ones that was ever attempted.
He included Mark 16, 9 through 20 in his Harmony of the Gospels and this is in 170 AD.
Way before those manuscripts that don't have it in there.
And these men are not some late medieval scribes tinkering with the text.
and putting things in there that shouldn't be there.
No, these are individuals quoting verses from Mark and long before others claimed they
weren't there, other documents show they were there.
In fact, it's very fascinating.
In the Codex Vaticanus, there is a blank space at the end of Mark.
And then after this long blank space, then the scribe begins the Book of Luke.
but he leaves a blank space which is not normal to do in manuscript copying.
So why would he do that?
It's been suggested he did it because he knew there was an ending to Mark that was
definitely not present in the copy that he was copying from.
His job as a scribe is copy from the copy that he's copying from.
and to make sure that he's copying it faithfully.
Well, if it didn't contain nine through 20, but he knew that, well, where did those
verses, let me show you how the gospel of Mark would end if you get rid of Mark 16, nine
through 20.
Let me just let you read it with me and tell me if this makes any sense at all to you
under the shining sun that God would end the gospel of Mark in this way.
This is what Mark 16.
would end with if we go by their get rid of nine through 20 mentality.
And they went out quickly and fled from the sepulcher, for they trembled and were amazed.
Neither said they anything to any man, for they were afraid.
The end.
So these women said nothing to anyone because they were afraid and that's the end of the
story.
We know that's not the way Matthew and Luke end their accounts.
And it makes perfect sense that the harmony between Mark and Matthew and Luke would
include this ending.
And let me give you one more strain of evidence.
These lectionaries.
What a lectionary was, I know today you and I have scripture readings often times in our
worship services, where the preacher will be asked, what scripture would you like for me
to read before you present your message?
Back then, they didn't all have a personal copy of the Word of God that they could buy at
Walmart and carry around with them.
So how did they know the reading that was to be done?
They would often print a section and have that done in a lectionary used for public
reading of scripture and worship.
These date back way past, way earlier than the fourth century BC.
Guess what passage just happens to be represented over and over again in those public
readings of scripture from the early centuries after Christ established his church.
Mark 16, nine through 20.
Let me tell you, it's in the Bible because it belongs in the Bible.
It is the inspired word of God.
Now that raises the second question though, is it relevant?
I mean, yes, it's inspired, but is it relevant?
Someone said, well, all inspired teaching from God is relevant.
What do you mean is it relevant?
Well, Jesus didn't speak those words to you.
He spoke them to His apostles directly, not to you, not to me.
And the apostles actually pretty much did what He said to do.
They went out and according to Colossians 1.23, the gospel had been preached to every
creature under heaven by the time Paul writes Colossians and the word had gone out into
all the world, Romans 10.18, and so the great commission, mission accomplished.
Yes, they did what they were commanded to do.
That was a command for them.
It has no relevance to you and to me today.
Couple of things, one, and I'm sure Brother Clark, Jimmy Clark,
would have alluded to this concept in his treatment of that message last night.
I'm thrilled to hear him today, but I didn't get to hear his message last night.
I'm looking forward to hearing it and going back and watching it.
But here is the concept Jesus gives in Matthew 28.
You make sure that everything I'm teaching you, you teach the people you baptize to
observe all things I'm commanding you.
Wait a minute, all things?
You know, what's one of the things I'm commanding you?
Go into all the world, make disciples of all the nations.
And then once you teach and baptize them, you teach them to observe all things I've
commanded you, one of which is to go make disciples of all nations.
And so even if you granted the argument that, mission accomplished, first century, they
did exactly what they were commanded to do, and it's all over now.
No, no, wait.
What about the thousands of babies being born each day in this world?
who never had a Gospel preacher tell them when they're old enough to understand that they
need the Gospel of Christ?
What about all the countless souls that are entering our world after the first century?
They don't need the Gospel.
The Apostles aren't on earth today to do the teaching and preaching.
And when you look at the book of Acts, you see very decisively that the Apostles stayed in
Jerusalem, but the Gospel didn't.
The members of the church were scattered abroad and went everywhere doing what?
Preaching the word.
And so yes, what does the Bible say?
Go preach to every creature.
He that believeth in his baptized shall be saved.
He that believeth not shall be damned.
And so yes, there's absolute relevance for the Great Commission today because
We now have surpassed eight billion souls in global population and there are millions and
millions and millions, I could even say billions, living in nations where either Christ
has never been known or heard of or.
They've heard about him, but the distorted gospel presented in which he's packaged is far
afield from what the New Testament teaches.
Who's going to teach?
If ever there were a time to take the charge of the Great Commission seriously, it is now
in this day and time, in this mixed up world, there's every bit as much of a need for it
tonight as there was the first night Jesus ever said those words.
And that raises another question, number three.
What does it look like when the gospel plan of salvation is preached to every creature?
And what is the expected response?
The only way you and I could know the answer to that question...
is to go to, I mean, is there a book we could go to that would show us, hey, here's where
they actually did what Jesus commissioned them to do, and here's what people did when they
did what Jesus commissioned them to do.
Is there such a book?
And you and I, of course, know that there is.
It is the Book of Acts.
And we can go and know exactly how the Great Commission was preached and how it was
responded to.
And we start, of course, in Acts 2 on that day of Pentecost.
Jesus Christ is preached, His death is burial, His resurrection is ascension.
And this causes people to be pricked in their hearts and say, what shall we do?
Preaching took place.
When they heard this, they were pricked in their hearts.
Go preach the gospel to every creature.
Well, if you preach it to every creature, that means someone's hearing the preaching.
And faith comes how?
By hearing and hearing by?
The Word of God, and so here the Word of God is preached in Acts 2.
Does it have any convicting power in Acts 2?
Does it have any convicting power tonight?
Absolutely so.
It's still just as powerful.
In one simple statement we see in Acts chapter 2, Peter preaching about Jesus Christ and
telling them, the same Jesus whom you crucified has been made both Lord and Christ.
What shall we do?
Does Peter say, well, I want every head bowed right now.
I want every head bowed.
Bow your heads now and repeat after me.
Lord Jesus, I know you exist.
I ask you to come into my heart.
I make you the Lord of my life.
Jesus, save me now.
Amen, amen.
How many of you just said, those of you who just said that prayer, come over here, come up
front here and you will be acknowledged.
Listen, you know as well as I do and though we...
chuckle at the idea of Peter doing it, it's not funny at all when it comes to souls being
misled like that, is it?
How many souls have heard that and believed that and accepted that and followed that and
now are telling others the same?
The Great Commission, when it was preached in the first century, produced individuals
desiring to repent and be baptized because that's what all men everywhere were commanded
to do.
Acts 17.30 says all men everywhere have been commanded to repent.
And we know that Peter said, repent and be baptized, how many?
Every one of you.
Why would you do it?
In the name of Jesus Christ, all authority has been given to me, he said in Matthew 28.
And in the name of Jesus Christ, by the authority of the one who has it, he said for you
to be baptized for the remission of sins.
Repent and be baptized for the remission of sins.
And so as you move through the book of Acts, the pattern is consistent.
There is in Acts chapter eight, when they heard Philip preaching or when they believed
Philip preaching the things concerning the kingdom of God in the name of Jesus Christ,
they were what?
Okay, he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved.
Go preach to every creature and the ones who hear what you preach and believe that,
they'll be saved.
Philip, you went to Samaria, what did you do there?
I preached Christ, Acts 8-5.
What did they do in response?
They believed and they were baptized, thus they were saved.
That's really not complicated, is it?
And later in that same chapter in Acts 8, the Ethiopian nobleman, Philip opens his mouth,
begins at the same scripture, go preach to every even an Ethiopian, yes, yes, preach
Jesus.
He opens his mouth, begins at the same scripture and preaches unto him Jesus.
What is the response?
Well, here's some water right now.
What's stopping me from being baptized?
And then the excellent sermon we just heard noted.
If you believe with all your heart, you may.
He that believeth in His baptism.
We've never taught, we shouldn't teach, He that is baptized shall be saved.
It's He that believeth in His baptized who shall be saved.
And so, Eunuch, you need to believe Jesus Christ is the Son of God as I preached it from
Isaiah 53.
And He says, do.
They went down into the water, both Philip and the eunuch came up out of the water and He
went on His way rejoicing Acts chapter 8.
35 through 39, the salt of Tarsus.
You saw Jesus on the road to Damascus.
Yes, I did.
You were talking to the one whose blood is going to wash away anyone's sins, all sins,
even from under the sins of the first testament, yes.
You talked to him directly, yes.
And I asked him, Lord, what do you want me to do?
Does Acts 9 depict Jesus saying, I want you to bow your head right now and ask me to come
into your heart, Saul?
Do it.
Remarkably, he tells him, arise, go into the city and there it shall be told thee what
thou must do.
Whatever he's told to do, must he do it?
And so tell me, why would Jesus send him to wait for a preacher to tell him what to do?
Does Jesus not know what he's supposed to do?
Yeah, he knows because it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching.
to save them that believe.
1 Corinthians chapter one, 18 through 21, and yes indeed, how shall they hear without a
preacher?
Preaching is God's method.
How dare we ever sully that and act like that's so old hat?
It's still God's method of salvation.
To preach the word and so the eunuch, yes, he hears preaching, Saul of Tarsus.
you, yes, Ananias told me what to do and he,
He told me to arise and be baptized and to wash away my sins, calling on the name of the
Lord.
That's how you call on the name of the Lord, by arising and being baptized as a penitent
confessing believer.
Now, one of the best examples of this for times sake is Acts 18, eight.
Now let's put Mark 16, 16, 15 and 16 down right here.
Let's put Acts 18, eight down right here and let's see if we can find any harmony.
Mark 16, 15, go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.
Verse 16, he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved.
He that believeth not shall be damned.
many of the Corinthians hearing, so there's the gospel being preached in Acts 18, many of
the Corinthians hearing did what?
Believed and were baptized and thus based on what Jesus said in Mark 16, 16, if you preach
and they hear it and they believe and they're baptized, they shall be.
The Corinthians heard, they believed.
They were baptized, thus they were saved.
That's what people still need tonight wherever the gospel is preached.
There's been no change.
And the epistles reinforce that same message.
And Paul makes it clear over and over again that baptism puts us into Christ.
According to Romans chapter six, three and four, it puts us into the death of Christ where
the blood of Christ was shed.
And that's where we contact his cleansing blood.
We're buried with our Lord in baptism and then raised through faith in the operation of
God, Colossians 2 and verse 12.
And what 1 Peter 321 says matches beautifully with what Jesus said in Mark 16, 16.
It's no wonder that some people have actually told stories about finding people who cut
certain verses out of their Bible.
I've always heard those stories and thought, well, surely no one's really doing that.
But then I've met some folks I know and
trust to tell the truth, and so it happened to me.
But think about it, if you are a textual critic and you know there's plenty of manuscript
evidence for Mark 16, nine through 20, and the versions show plenty of evidence for the
inclusion of Mark 16, nine to 20, and the church historians, the early church historians
are uniformly quoting Mark 16, nine to 20, and you've got these lectionaries, these public
readings of scripture, all including Mark 16, nine to 20.
Tell me, pray tell, why would you suddenly decide, well, those don't really belong in the
New Testament after all because of two ancient witnesses who are also missing other books
or materials saying it's not in there, therefore it shouldn't be in ours.
Something's going on.
And it's not godly.
As I close out this part of this, I want to point out this question is one of the most
important ones to ask.
How are we doing in fulfilling the Great Commission in our day and time compared to the
New Testament church in their day and time?
Of course, I'm aware of the fact that they had social media at their fingertips and they
had broadcast networks available to them.
and airplanes, they had television stations to broadcast to the masses.
I'm aware of the fact that they had printing presses, and that, of course, I'm speaking
very much tongue-in-cheek, as you know.
tell me how in the world they didn't have those things.
And they were able to get to the point where we read in Colossians 1.23, the Gospels
preach to every creature under heaven and the Gospel had gone out to the ends of the world
and here we are with all of those things and you wonder sometimes how are we doing?
And I'm not painting with a broad brush here and saying everyone in this room needs to
hear this in this way but I am suggesting to you this.
There is something concerning about the fact that we can talk freely about politics and
sports and the latest sale that we found and the latest antique we were able to finally
pinpoint and track down, et cetera, Binge watching a certain show and talking to all of
our friends about the characters and the things that happened in that show.
And hey, do you know the next Marvel movie's release date?
I can't wait.
Let's go, let's go together and we can talk about all these things effortlessly.
And when people start talking about Jesus Christ, it's like silence.
You know it's sad that there have been occasions, and don't get me wrong, I feel a little
uncomfortable sometimes when a player who's victorious, even on a team that I'm rooting
for, starts giving God credit for their victory.
Because I know that God's got much more to be concerned about than who won the Super Bowl
or who won the championship game.
And though I'm...
glad to live in a country where people are not bashful to mention Jesus Christ and God.
I know academically they're not really up there pulling strings to make sure this team
wins and the other one doesn't.
But I am very offended that sometimes networks will deliberately edit out any references
that someone might make to God or Christ.
I guarantee you, if some of these people were mentioning Mohammed, they would never dare
try to take that out for fear of all of the accusations of anti-Muslim prejudice they
would receive for that.
It seems that Christianity is the only group today that's supposed to just hush and be
quiet while everyone else gets to say whatever they think.
I don't know if you heard about the car mechanic who worked with
some other mechanics and they were pretty free with their language and it wasn't good
language.
And they would cuss openly in front of him.
so one day, they knew he was a church going member.
And so one day he's in there working on, and he said, praise God and hallelujah.
And I mean that reverently.
Thank you God.
And he just went on like that for a minute or two.
And they looked at him like, are you crazy?
What are you doing?
He said, I'm just trying to give God equal time.
Well, I'm not saying that's the best method, but I'm saying I understand sometimes you and
I feel like we're being drowned out by the world and all that it's saying.
And my wife and I were at a movie theater many years ago now.
It's been so many years ago now, I couldn't tell you the movie, but I do not forget the
factoid they flashed up on the screen.
It said, did you know the average running time of movies today,
is 30 minutes longer than movies from 50 years ago.
average running time of movies today 30 minutes longer than movies of 50 years ago.
I'm probably the only one in the theater that was thinking along these lines.
I started thinking, hmm, the average sermon today.
Would the average sermon today preached in most places be longer or shorter than 50 years
ago?
So wait a minute, the movies, Satan's billboards, getting longer.
More air time, more exposure to filth and corruption.
The sermons calling men to righteousness getting shorter, shorter, shorter.
And we can't have full length gospel meetings, you know that.
That won't work.
Sunday through Wednesday won't work.
So we're gonna have to go to...
Friday, Saturday, Sunday.
By the way, it's not wrong.
I'm not saying any these are wrong, but I'm asking about the mentality sometimes because
I've then seen some of those churches say, people aren't attending the Friday, Saturday
session.
Let's just do a one day Sunday and be done with it.
So let me ask you a question.
If people are hearing more from the devilish mindset and less from God's Word, is it any
wonder our society is in the mixed up place it is?
And so what do we do?
Go preach!
Preach the Gospel to every creature.
Preach it!
Don't be ashamed of it.
Preach it!
He that believeth in his baptism shall be saved.
There are people out there living lives that are not satisfying to them.
They just need someone to come and show them a better way.
And you and I should not be of the mindset that says, well, I'm not going to even try with
this guy.
He seems so far gone.
I don't think there's any way he would ever obey the gospel.
I'm writing him off.
I this as I close because I wouldn't even be standing here tonight, most likely, if that
had been the mentality of a teenage boy.
in Okinawa, looking at my sin-sick father, alcoholic.
miserable, suicidal.
I'd never met him.
I would not meet him until I was 18 months old because he was overseas when I was born.
And he was thinking about ending his life while over there until a teenager from Coleman,
Texas whose dad was an elder in the church, whose mom was a Bible school teacher in the
church, and who had raised that boy up in the way he should go.
And so evangelists are not just preachers, right?
Not just full-time preachers?
So here's the teenage boy from Coleman, Texas looking at a sin-sick, miserable mess of a
man in Okinawa, Japan, and he simply says one thing to him, you know, I believe if I were
you, I'd start reading my Bible.
That's all he said.
And when he said it, my dad ridiculed it to his face.
Gotta be tough guy, know, Bible, sissy stuff.
In his bunk at night?
I've never tried the Bible.
I've tried wine.
I've tried so many things.
I've never tried the Bible.
I want to ask you some questions.
The 17-year-old boy says, I'll do the best I can, but why don't you start going to church
with me at the Ojana Church of Christ on the village of Okinawa.
They went.
A man by the name of Robert George met my sin-sick dad, had a Bible study with him, and
baptized him into Christ.
He came back home, fell away.
And on his milk route one day saw the Church of Christ in Elmwood, Illinois, the building.
uh on his milk route ended up being a right turn in his life.
thought, what am I doing?
The happiest I've ever been is when I was in the church and faithful, I'm going back.
Honey, will you go to church?
No, I won't go with you.
So he took me and my brother, just us.
And we'd come home and sing to my mother and ask her to come with us.
And finally in the late 60's she started doing that.
And finally in the late 60's she was baptized into Jesus Christ and no one could find my
dad.
Where is he?
he's over here in this classroom by him.
crying his eyes out for joy that he's united in Christ with his wife and now they can
teach their children to love God and serve him too.
And I think to myself, what evangelism that was.
Go preach the gospel, yes.
Remember the people that left in Axaite to go preach, it weren't the apostles.
They were still doing their work in Jerusalem to be sure and preaching, yes.
But there were people who were not preachers who were scattering the seed and sowing that
seed.
And we still need to be doing that tonight.
I'll close with this and I apologize for the personal nature of it, but when I think of
evangelism, you can understand why I don't always just think of a preacher at a gospel
meeting getting people to respond to the invitation.
Sometimes it happens in a personal conversation between a faithful member of the church
and someone that's so sick of sin they're about to check out on us.
And they just want someone to offer them a nugget of hope.
So the teenage boy that helped my dad find the gospel.
comes home from the service.
is driving home from his fiance's house.
It's wet.
It's raining.
His car hydroplanes and goes hurtling through the air and smashes head on into a tree.
and he didn't die.
but he was quadriplegic, rendered paralyzed in all four limbs.
His fiance said, I will still marry you.
And he said, I love you too much to let you.
I can't give you what you need as a husband.
I can't father your children in the 60s, the early 60s.
It was just not a possible thing even ethically to try to think about doing.
There was no means.
So if I love you, I'm going to let you go and find the
someone who can give you all the things you deserve to have, motherhood, et cetera, et
cetera, et cetera.
I said all that to say this, when he died, before he died, the last 18 hours of his life
before he lapsed into the coma, before he died, this is what Joe Crockett did in the
nursing home or skilled nursing facility in which he lived.
For 18 hours, he came out of his coma and was completely coherent, could talk to anyone.
Everyone that came in the room to visit with his neighbor in the bed next to him or that
came to visit him or a doctor or a nurse who just happened to be walking through, Joe
would do this every time, hey, before you leave, do me a favor, pull that drawer open
right next to my bed.
And this is so long ago, you'll understand the antiquated references to.
Get you a CD out of there of a sermon and listen to that sermon and then come back and
tell me what you thought about it.
Hey, there's a cassette tape in there with some videos or sermons on there.
Get you one of those and watch it and then come back and tell me what you thought about
it.
This man lived the last 18 hours of his life the same way he'd lived his life.
as a teenage boy trying to evangelize and save the lost by just planting the seed of truth
into their minds.
And if we leave here tonight and we have that Acts 8-4 mentality, wherever I go I scatter
the seed.
If we have that Joe Crockett mentality that says, yes, I'm going to share what I know with
miserable people who need it too, I'm telling you, there are souls out there just like.
my sin sick father and yours perhaps who will respond if someone will just show them?
And so I pray we'll leave tonight motivated with all the sermons that you've heard, the
ones you're going to be privileged to continue to hear before this lectureship closes out
and then all of us to go out of this place and say, I'm going to drop little nuggets and
seed everywhere I go knowing there's power in the Gospel that's why I'm preaching to every
creature.
so that he that believeth in us baptize shall be saved.
If you're here tonight and you need to be saved, would it thrill us to see you do that?
Absolutely.
By hearing, believing, repenting, confessing, and being baptized, you can become a member
of the body of Christ, and then you can go out and tell everyone else how to come with you
into the body of Christ and someday into the heavenly realm where we'll live with him
forevermore.
We love you, we pray you'll love him too.
As together we stand and sing, won't you come if you need to, please, won't you?